The Routledge Handbook of Critical Pedagogies for Social Work

Christine Morley, Phillip Ablett, Carolyn Noble, Stephen Cowden, Christine Morley, Phillip Ablett, Carolyn Noble, Stephen Cowden

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9781138545748
• eBook ISBN: 9781351002028
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Social Work
• Index: Social Sciences

The Routledge Handbook of Critical Pedagogies for Social Work traverses new territory by providing a cutting-edge overview of the work of classic and contemporary theorists, in a way that expands their application and utility in social work education and practice; thus, providing a bridge between critical theory, philosophy, and social work.

Each chapter showcases the work of a specific critical educational, philosophical, and/or social theorist including: Henry Giroux, Michel Foucault, Cornelius Castoriadis, Herbert Marcuse, Paulo Freire, bell hooks, Joan Tronto, Iris Marion Young, Karl Marx, Antonio Gramsci, and many others, to elucidate the ways in which their key pedagogic concepts can be applied to specific aspects of social work education and practice. The text exhibits a range of research-based approaches to educating social work practitioners as agents of social change. It provides a robust, and much needed, alternative paradigm to the technique-driven 'conservative revolution' currently being fostered by neoliberalism in both social work education and practice.

The volume will be instructive for social work educators who aim to teach for social change, by assisting students to develop counter-hegemonic practices of resistance and agency, and reflecting on the pedagogic role of social work practice more widely. The volume holds relevance for both postgraduate and undergraduate/qualifying social work and human services courses around the world.

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Introduction

The imperative of critical pedagogies for social work

Christine Morley

queensland university of technology, australia

Phillip Ablett

university of the sunshine coast, queensland, australia

Carolyn Noble

australian college of applied psychology, sydney, australia

Introduction

This Handbook brings together the work of critical educational, philosophical and social theorists to reinvigorate social work education as an emancipatory practice. Although we are not accustomed to thinking of social work and public education together, they are products of—and responses to—social problems arising from modernity. In this context, as Walter Lorenz (2004) has insightfully observed, both social work and education have always been conceived as instruments for socialising individuals to become ‘citizens’. However, citizenship is a contested and multilayered term. On the one hand, it means democratic agents capable of collective deliberation and self-determination. On the other, it is a marker for drawing boundaries, enforcing exclusion and disciplining people into being productive workers for the dominant economic system. In this collection, while favouring the former view, all contributions critically explore the nature or impact of this contestation as it is expressed in social work education and practice.

When discussing our enthusiasm for this project, some people asked us: why a book on ­critical pedagogies? What has that got to do with social work? We assert that critical pedagogies hold fundamental importance for social work because:

1. current contexts mean social work practitioners, now, and into the future, need to know how to think critically and engage in praxis (the linking of theory and practice) to formulate effective and ethical responses to some of the anticipated social problems facing humanity in the coming decades (we know critical pedagogies are central to this);
2. the way education is shaped by current contexts closes down spaces for critical thinking and therefore restricts social work’s effectiveness to respond ethically to new and emerging social problems, thus necessitating the need to mobilise critical pedagogies as strategies for resistance;
3. the synergistic overlap between social work and education means both disciplines—with their potentials and pitfalls—have a role in either supporting or undermining a democratic public, which we believe should be activated for the former;
4. there is an urgent need for critical pedagogies in social work to counter global social problems, and mitigate restriction of social work’s capacity to maintain integrity as a social justice profession; and
5. there is a current lack of critical theorising around pedagogy (beyond knowledge transfer) within social work, and a need to realise educational alternatives to contribute to a more socially just world.

Our current contexts

We inhabit a world of glaring divisions, crises and change, escalating disparities in wealth and power, human rights violations, wars and unprecedented ecological despoliation. Jim Ife (2019, p. viii), a contemporary social work commentator (and author of Chapter 24 on Donna ­Haraway and the Chthulucene), describes our troubled contexts as

characterised by runaway growth regardless of social and environmental cost, neoliberal economics, global capitalism ‘on steroids’, managerialism pervading social work ­organisations, increasing inequality, individualism, consumerism, greed, intolerance of difference, and a blatantly unsustainable social, economic and political order supported by powerful media and corporate interests.

Similarly, critical educationalist Henry Giroux (co-author of the Foreword for this collection with Ourania Filippakou; see also Chapter 17 by Christine Morley and Phillip Ablett) reminds us that the contemporary rise of authoritarianism, the election of populist right-wing governments, the resurgence of fascism, and the mobilisation of xenophobic views, scapegoating ethnic and religious difference for the problems caused by global capitalism, creates the perfect conditions for what Hannah Arendt (see Chapter 36 by Uschi Bay) refers to as ‘dark times’ (Giroux 2015, p. 3). These crises are accompanied and often bolstered by a global technological revolution, centred on information technology, computerisation, digitisation, the enhancement of artificial intelligence and robotisation that are radically transforming education, social work and society generally. Education, including social work education, does not stand outside of these issues and trends. Consequently, those concerned with education in the social professions must find ways to resist the forces that produce oppression, and simultaneously, play a role in the formation of change makers who will work toward a more socially just, democratic, ecologically sustainable and compassionate world.

In many ways, we see social work education as one of the last bastions upholding social justice ideals within social work, even if the walls have been breached and struggle ensues within. It is therefore more important than ever that social work education is revitalised as a progressive project in influencing future practitioners, the field, and society more generally. Given the dominance of conservative, New Public Management approaches to social policy (in many Western capitalist countries), critical practices consistent with the espoused values of social work, such as ‘empowerment’ and ‘social justice’, will not necessarily emerge from, or be supported by, mainstream human service organisations within the field. Social work education, we argue, must play a leading role in preserving and advancing an emancipatory agenda through a multiplicity of strategies.

The contemporary contexts of social work practice

The contemporary contexts in which social work operates have been dominated by aggressive neoliberal governmentality for more than three decades (see for example Boryczko 2019; Ferguson & Lavalette 2006; Garrett 2018a, 2018b; Madhu 2011; Rees 1991). This has profound implications both for the populations that social workers serve and for social work itself. The people and communities with whom social workers engage are subjected to increasing economic inequalities and poverty, a greater sense of precariousness created by employment insecurity and flexibility, and dominant discourses of individual responsibility and blame for structural problems, which are used to justify punitive social reforms (Garrett 2010). In Australia, the introduction of mandatory drug testing for welfare recipients and the cashless welfare card that simultaneously stigmatises marginalised populations and controls their spending, provide pertinent examples. Such economic injustice often amplifies other forms of oppression along ethnic, ability, gender, age, sexuality and other dimensions of diversity lines.

Social work’s aim, according to the Global Definition of the International Federation of Social Workers (IFSW 2014) is to promote ‘social justice, human rights, collective responsibility and respect for diversities’ for everyone, regardless of their social positioning. Yet social work’s responses to increasingly harsh welfare regimes that orchestrate hardship, often reflect neoliberal social control agendas (Agllias et al. 2016; Marston & McDonald 2008; Parrott 2014); or at best, are ambiguous. Neoliberal, managerial and right-wing populist discourses have significantly shaped the types of practices social workers deliver, resulting in a deleterious impact on social workers’ capacities to keep faith with their espoused emancipatory values and vision (see for example, Allan 2009; Fenton 2014).

By no means immune to the preceding hegemonic influences, social workers can become trained in practices of surveillance and extending the assertion of state power and authority in people’s lives’ that are oppressive. This leads to victim blaming discourses that construct people in need of support as ‘undeserving’, the diligent implementation of austerity measures and administration of punitive sanctions for ‘troublesome’ groups. Many practitioners are reluctant to challenge organisational injustices in the context of job insecurity and a decline in unionised workplaces, thereby mistaking organisational compliance as ‘ethical’ practice (Banks 2012). Hence, the neoliberal context in which human service organisations operate, promote an uncritical, passive, technique-driven, formulaic, rule-bound and competency-based style of practice. Understanding this context highlights the imperative of social work education to ­disrupt and, where possible, counter dominant approaches to practice.

In addition, business and market principles have colonised the sector with managerial practices focused mostly on cost containment and risk management. This means services function without adequate resourcing and are preoccupied with protecting themselves from potential litigation. This has resulted in:

• auditing, surveillance and compliance with operational standards at the expense of service quality;
• standardisation of practice at the expense of practitioner autonomy and discretion;
• risk assessment and management at the expense of people’s rights and needs;
• the quest for objectivity and evidence-based practice in an attempt to eliminate uncertainty at the expense of multiple and diverse forms of knowledge; and
• the privileging of technical practices and individualised and medicalised views of the world at the expense of critical theory, critical analysis and critical self-reflection.

Such practices have, unfortunately, become commonplace in contemporary human service organisations. The consequences of these changes, which include conservatising the profession to make it more ‘politically acceptable’ to government and industry employers (Dominelli 1996, p. 163, italics in original), has led commentators such as Gray and Webb (2013, p. 7), to designate neoliberalism the most ‘vicious adversary’ to the possibility of social work developing a more emancipatory agenda.

The impact of neoliberalism on social work education

Consistent with the trends toward managerialisation in social work practice, and in recognising education can be a powerful source of resistance to neoliberal orthodoxy, the policies of conservative governments have sought to strip universities of their critical faculties (Hil 2012). While there is considerable research evidence outlining the consequences of neoliberalism for higher education generally (see for example, Berg et al. 2016; Fraser & Taylor 2016; Giroux 2014, 2015; Hil 2012, 2015; Marginson & Considine 2000; O’Sullivan 2016; Williams 2016), an emerging body of literature has specifically critiqued the impact of neoliberalism on social work education, noting the adverse consequences for teaching, curricula development and research (Fenton 2014; Garrett 2010, 2015; Hanesworth 2017; Morley et al. 2017; Preston & Aslett 2014; Wagner & Yee 2011; Zuchowski et al. 2014).

Current policy directions within the academy seek to eradicate opportunities for critical thinking (Garrett 2009), instead valorising market-driven, technicist practices across all disciplines, including social work (Fenton 2014; Fraser & Taylor 2016; Hil 2012). With this backdrop, mainstream educational approaches to social work have been complicit in reducing learning and teaching to the most efficient and cost-effective transfer of information from educators to students. This rarely results in transformative learning, and socialises students to be technically competent practitioners who accept the status quo, even when it is against social work’s defining ethical principles (Fenton 2014; Garrett 2009; Macfarlane 2016). In this way, mainstream social work education serves the goals of neoliberal governance by encouraging students to ‘fit in’; to not ‘make waves’ or ‘rock the boat’ (Morley 2019, p. 440).

Increased administrative interference into teaching and curriculum by learning design specialists (who rarely have discipline-specific knowledge in the areas they advise upon), also promotes a focus on technique and technologies at the expense of substantive content. Academics subject to this managerial regime are time poor and operate in a culture of perpetual audits and reviews, mediated by templates, and have reduced discretion to develop creative or rigorous teaching practices. This results in teaching being undertaken as a technical, rather than intellectual and political activity concerned with the formation of critical professionals and citizens. In fact, as universities increasingly prioritise competitive research grant (funding) over all other educational functions and activities, teaching is often used to punish those who are assessed as not performing highly enough as researchers (Hil 2012). Alongside this devaluing of teaching is a push for rote learning, measured by multiple choice exams and on-line quizzes that generate passive learners focused on skills acquisition, rather than transformative learning (Giroux 2011). In this context, students are often more focused and ‘energised’ by technological glitches than the content of their courses.

By contrast, transformative learning of the sort advocated in this collection, involves deep learning that confronts and challenges taken-for-granted assumptions. This is the sort of ­learning that ‘is essential for a democratic society and fundamental to creating the conditions for ­producing citizens who are critical, self-reflective, knowledgeable, and willing to make moral judgments and act in a socially responsible way’ (Giroux 2011, p. 3). In view of its global definition (IFSW 2014) and the concordant value statements of most social work professional associations throughout the world, such qualities are crucial to the development of social workers.

Within the managerial revolution, there is also a strong emphasis on presenting all knowledge as if it is neutral and objective. Curriculum is therefore limited to covering knowledge considered to be ‘safe’; that is—knowledge that does not fundamentally contest the interests of power elites. Safe knowledge is not, of course, neutral or objective, but masquerades as such to affirm the status quo. It legitimises neoliberal value...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of Contributors
• Foreword
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• 1. Introduction: the imperative of critical pedagogies for social work
• PART I: Key foundational concepts
• PART II: Specific applications: fields of practice, postcolonial and Southern voices, practice methods, and fields of practice
• Postcolonial and Southern pedagogies
• Practice methods
• Index